Under your bed
by Devilishasshole
Summary: A young demon, wise beyond his years kidnaps a young girl whilst on the run during a war.
1. Seige

**A/N- Please review whether it be good or bad. I hope you enjoy.**

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I yawn for what seems to be the thousandth time in a single moment and roll my eyes. Given certain circumstances there wasn't a whole lot I could offer but my agitation for standing in lines.

"OK we get it you're impatient."

"She's got a point this line hasn't moved in weeks."

"oh shut the eff up we've been here for less than an hour, haven't you ever waited for anything in life, nothings free...not even an escape."

Someone within my band of friends groans and arms latch on to mine like the body of a leather skinned snake. I tremble at briefly then accept the intruder with as little discomfort as I can in such short notice. I wasn't fond of iciness, not when I was just beginning to warm up.

"I'm hungry." The voice beside me complains, I look to my side and a blond girl with cerulean blue eyes standing a little over an inch above me places her head on my shoulder. A earthly rosy aroma cling to her silky pale flesh and she sighs sorrowfully against my neck. I place a hand on her head and lean against her golden wisps of hair with a labored breath.

"I'll say..." I agreed hopelessly with a small nod of acceptance that we'd both be hungry for a bit longer. A yawn slithers from my brittle lips and I stare at the long winding line ahead of us riddled with people, luggage and officers arrayed in black lawful cloaks and stern looks and aged scars.

 _Did it have to be this cold? Did there have to be so many freakin people fleeing the city? Why wasn't there a protocol and why didn't they tell people to pack lightly?_

The ground beneath my slipper concealed feet quaked just before the massive crowd of people roared with horror, my friends looked up to the sky and Ino, my friend beside me shivered and shook her head.

"As long as we're here..."

"We'll be gone soon." I reply before she can wallow in her thoughts. "Safe...and together, hopefully with a stomach full of curry and rice."

She smiles tightly and sniffs fufillingly. "Are you trying to give me hope or give me more hunger cramps..."

"Yep, won't be long, only got four-thousand people to cram into the only exit train in the city. A brilliant contingency plan they said, no one accounted that every citizen in the city would try to pack their entire house...pretty sure there's a dude around here hauling a coffin." My friend Kiba scoffed derisively, he raised his head to leer over the masses. A raccoon fur'd hoodie fell over his soot stained face, his jacket had been covered in debris and he managed to still have his sarcasm intact in spite of any situation. Typical.

I felt as though we were all having the same nightmare and because of that we all managed to keep our heads, for now.

The moment the bombs hit I was ripped out of whatever comfort and assurance I had left. I rushed out of my bed to confirm my horror and though I had the impulse to just look out my window and cry my feet told me to run, run before it got me too. Seeing the gaping hole in the middle of the city inspired me with fear, something I hadn't felt tugging at me until that exact moment.

Afraid though I had no one to live for but myself.

I had no one to panic with so I ran out into the chaos of everyone else. People were running away, I couldn't distinguish a single face twisted up in horror. The sand and destruction allowed a thick smoke to cloud out everyone. Some fell and others ran them through, masses running over people I felt no desire to die beneath the thousands of feet of a city fleeing so I ran, ran and ignored my quivering heart.

 _The screams..._

"Kiba did you happen to see Choji...or Naruto?" I inquire realizing there were people missing from our clique of orphans. Kiba simply shrugs.

"We can only assume they're somewhere in this line." Ino spoke up as if she knew without a doubt that they had made it out of the trials within the city.

"Or dead." Kiba proclaimed carelessly.

Ino elbowed him in the back and barked out a curse, rolling his eyes.

"Just keeping our options open"

"Negativity isn't an option." she countered curtly.

"Ya because there's so much positivity going on...look around, Konoha is dying." He informs us as though we had missed out on something. He crosses his arms over his chest and shakes his head as though he had given up on the topic. I roll my eyes again.

I couldn't process it. I couldn't process anything but I was glad that I wasn't alone. It was easy to not think about what I had seen earlier. It was easy to forget the streets covered in puddles of blood and bodies littered, lifeless.

I closed my eyes and then pulled myself from Ino's arms.

"Sakura, what's wrong?"

"You're right you know, maybe they're in this line...I'll go look.."

"I'm coming with you!"

"No, stay put...I'll be back soon as I get them."

"What?" they both barked dubiously.

"That's not a good line to leave us on, haven't you watched movies like this?"

Ino sucked her teeth at Kiba and then her face softened, cocking her head to the side she reached out to grab my hand.

"None of us bought luggage like everyone else, just each other and if there's any hope that Choji or Naruto are in this line we owe it to ourselves to stay together, we promised each other that much..."

They both stare at me dumbfound and then Ino claps both her hands together and hides her face with a sigh of distress.

"You promise you'll be back."

"Scouts honor..." I say.

"How reassuring..." Kibba says with a blank stare.

I lick my lips and point threateningly at him.

"Shut up." I say and he raises his arms gauzed hands in surrender. I reach out and grab Ino's arm. She's wearing a purple poncho. I shake her. "I'll be back keep an eye on Dog breath."

She smiles reluctantly and yanks at my tan poncho.

"You had better..."

With a final nod and the thought that I was doing something selfless and noble I back away, twist around on a foot and start off towards the back. My eyes scanning over grubby war-torn faces. People give me a look that they use on common vermin, like they wanted to swat me away or chase me away with a broom. I ignore the stares of gloom and the cries of pain.

The further I walk down the line the more blood soaked people I encounter. I can taste copper in the wind, the distress alarm for the city sounds a pitch higher than it had in the front.

"HEY YOU! DEMON!"

I don't know why but I pause and look over my shoulder towards the howls of authoritative voices, black robes spanking around in the wind and they looked to be coming towards me. Silver weapons drawn.

 _Why?_

People began to panic at the word _Demon._

No thanks to my body going stiff someone gets the wrong idea and starts swinging at me. I manage to dodge a right hook on a whims notice, a whistle touches my ear and I try to bark out a protest. My heart thrashes in my chest but the adrenaline doesn't kick in fast enough to prevent me from being knocked on my ass. A fist connects with my cheek and I'm reeling. My cheek throbbing, my eye swollen.

I go deaf for a brief moment, only hearing the faintness of my bodies pulse.

Everyone is jostling around as though lava is sparking beneath them.

People are screaming over the siren and I'm suffering to regain my composure after being decked in the face on such short notice. My ears are ringing and I'm staggering to my feet as though I had a loose screw. I can smell my blood and feel it running down my lips, hot and thick. The taste of copper piques my senses.

"DEMON!" I keep hearing someone scream, my body jerks around as people run past me with no regards. I blink a few times so that my eyes can adjust to what was happening.

After several blinks my head spins and I stagger sideways. The voices all drown out and only one thing is clear.

 _I might die._

 _This might really happen._

Something grabs both my shoulders and as lethargic as I feel, I fall into whatever that was only for it to force me to stand. Squeezing my shoulders tightly, like a hug, like support.

I raise my head as best I could realizing that I must've looked like a doll with a broken head and a battered face.

Someone has me securely wrapped in their arms.

 _Kiba? Oh Kiba._

but the moment I see the face hovering over me all hope drains the color from my face. I felt sick and sleepy.

 _So sleepy._

I frown, my heavy lips open to say 'who' but my tongue is too thick and my face feels tight.

"Shhh..." the person chides in the calmest of tones. Something black, like feathers tickles my face and the closer he gets the more I realize that I don't know him or what he intends to do, until it's too late and hes kissing me.

Despite what my mind felt it had to do my body could not assist it. I was limp and restrained.

 _This stranger...kissing me._

Kissing me like I was his.

My eyes shot open in a panic and I screamed against his lips. A reaction that only made him kiss me harder, his tongue captured mine without the slightest hint of repulsion. I felt his fingers in my hair pulling me closer, his other hand pressed my body impossibly closer and maintained a clasp of iron all the way through.

I could see the authorities pushing pass us without as much as a second glance.

"Where the hell did that devil go..."

"...I don't think I wanna find out...we need to send off the first train...no time to wait, none of these civilians are equipped for combat."

Those had been the last words before they began to shuffle back towards the front and with them, any hope to get back to my friends. I turn my eyes with disdain on the person and to my horror coal black eyes greet me. My heart trembles in fear. I can see my blood smeared on his cheeks and lips.

Eyes shouldn't be that dark...pupiless.

 _Was this the...thing? The demon..._

 _I had never seen one before, none of us had...up close._

The kiss ends bitterly, with a bite to my lip. The moment he released my tormented mouth I start going off, screaming, gathering every ounce of terror because I had tons of that to scream out.

He seemed to have been expecting that reaction.

He says something under his breath and I can hear something crack against my skull and then...

 _Nothing._


	2. Orphans

**A/N- A day prior to the attack. I thought you'd like to read about that since it began without clarity. Anyway I hope you enjoy this chapter as well and I enjoy your input. Thank you for reading in advance. Bye lovelies.**

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"What do you think they mean by...unknowns?"

"Strangers idiot, by this time next week this city will be crawling with uglies from all over the world or more suckers with money."

"Guess they'll fit right in since your mug beat them here a long time ago."

The moment Ino starts laughing at her own insult Kiba pops out his go-to deadliest threat. A Swiss army knife he had pried from the dead fingers of a homeless man in the Ville weeks ago. He brandishes it her way with a tight lipped expression, full of intentions. A spark dances in his dull eyes and Ino rolls her eyes and flips him off.

"Maybe you'd like to greet them with a permanent smile on those succulent lips...forever." he teased raising his brows and jerking the knife her way like he didn't care for empty threats.

"I dare you...you won't live long enough to regret it!" Ino laughed fervently, raising from her stool competitively, her pale blond hair fell over her left eye and the wind tossed the rest around angrily. She almost looked like the goddess of fury. It wasn't rare of she and Kiba to go at it. They argued as though they had been a struggling married couple since I met them. They were too magnets that always repelled one another until they were forced to coexist.

Thanks to me being their friend, I often forced them to undergo the formalities friendship entails.

 _Friends didn't stab other friends with dead peoples knives._

"Can you two stop flirting, geeze it's driving me nuts!"

Someone called out with aggravation. Ino fell back down to sit on her stool and shrugged her poncho back onto her shoulders. She gave Kiba a final leer and he smirked and winked at her. She grunted like an uppity rich woman and turned her nose up in disdain.

"What would you know about flirting Naruto?" She inquired, bothered.

I looked over at the spiky haired blonde who sat beside me. He held his face over a bowl of steamy cream. Chop sticks digging away at the gruel, he didn't seem particularly fond of what lurked on his plate.

He rolled his shoulders back and belched before getting his baring together and pointing his sticks chopsticks at Ino.

"I know enough to know that you're just begging for the attention and Kibes just gives it to ya, although I guess I see why he does...you're just asking for it."

"AND WHAT WOULD THAT BE EXACTLY, THAT I'M ASKIN FOR!"

Ino shouts squinting her eyes, her brows lower perfectly over them. Her face mashes up evilly, her fist tight at her side. Naruto simply smirks and pulls the chopsticks to his lips to lick on the gruel that stuck to it.

Naruto was the newest addition to our motley crew of wanderers. He often helped me juggle the lovebirds and Choji when their voices over powered my own. The five of us. We slept where we could and often wondered where we came from. After escaping an actual orphanage, which hadn't been humane at all. We counted ourselves the lucky ones. The kids who escaped captivity from the horrors of those who sought to kill our joy, or...us.

 _Some things in this city were better left unsaid._

"Don't even get me started..." Naruto says simply, his voice hoarse, he begins slurping on his chopsticks.

"That's enough out of the lot of you, who's gonna help me close up shop!"

A raspy voice shatters the growing tension and a man with heavy boots stomps into the bar with his hands tucked into the pockets of a tattered navy blue apron. He quirks his head to the side to examine all of us without much expectation of a volunteer.

I raise my hand and he reaches behind his back to withdraw a dishcloth. He hurls one at me and I hop from my stool to catch it like a pony with tricks.

"Sak, just give my tables a nice spit shine, thank you sweetheart."

I nod, the corners of my lips quirked up. It was the least I could do, after all, we would all be as good as dead had it not been for Iruka feeding us scraps from his noodle bar. As rancid as the scraps were, on an empty stomach they warmed your stomach and made you full. It may not have been the finest thing that the restaurant had to offer but it was enough to get by and I felt indebted to the man for having a heart. Many people had lost that type of generosity but Iruka had always been the type of man who bargained with orphans, he also trusted us not to rob him blind.

Even after the wanted posters came up and he could identify us as the thieves the city knew us as. He didn't look at us any differently.

Maybe he felt obligated to do so since he had been former military. Maybe it's hard to break the code of caring for someone who had been caring for so long. I can't help but to think this was instinct. To put his life on the line for us without ever truly knowing our intentions.

I'm leaning into a table and rubbing at bread crumbs, all the while watching Iruka fuss at Naruto and Kiba for picking on Ino. Ino stands behind him making faces at both boys with her fist on her hips.

 _Iruka..._

My chest tingles and something tickles my spine. I laugh at the weightless feeling and then spit a wad of saliva on the tables to free myself of whatever I was feeling.

I felt the tiniest bit of love for him. I admired him and the way he treated us. I'm not sure if harboring those feelings meant that I loved him but I was more than sure that he treated me as a child just like everyone else.

We are children after all.

The useless kind according to most the people in the city.

"Do you believe in aliens Iruka?" Someone rustled a bag of chips a few tables over. It had been Choji, his cantankerous form hunched over a table indulging in the last bits of nacho chips. The tinge of spice wafted beneath my nostrils and my stomach felt ready to erupt.

"Aliens?" Iruka repeated dubiously. "...the world isn't big for no reason." he answered.

"Not those Aliens...the unknowns, that the city are gonna let in soon. Do you think it's safe?"

Iruka grimaced at the question and then began to collect our ceramic bowls with the remnants of gruel. The dishes clinked as he placed them on a tray.

"If we live our lives in fear how will the unknown ever reveal itself to us and become the known?"

"Confucius say what?" joked Kiba, with a loud laugh that began to extinguish itself when we all stared at him unaware of the joke. He rolled his guys. "I live among fools" was all he said to defend himself.

Iruka adopted a stoic face and placed down his collecting tray. He leaned his forearm on the bar and stared at Choji.

"What have you got to be worried about...all the rumors going around about demons?"

Choji nodded.

"Well yeah, Konoha's boarders have been closed for Millenia...so many things out there, we have never seen and no-"

"That's where you're wrong, in order for the boarders to have been closed in the first place, they would have had to be open first. Things just don't decide to lock the world out...fear comes and then, terrified, we eject ourselves...this city was never meant to be hidden from the world. Fear did that, no more living in fear man."

Choji was the fearful one out of the rest of us. When we had it in our minds to eat at any cost he would always side against us out of being scared of getting caught. If it were up to him we would live in the forest and try our hand at hunting the wild life. None of us ever gave him shit about it but after awhile it did get rather annoying when he tried to preach to us about morality while we starved.

Hunger seemed to be the one thing that motivated us to do the things that we did, even when Choji was hungry enough he gave into his desires and committed crimes with us in the name of survival.

We never killed anyone though it was heavily implied that we would if they didn't comply.

No one ever took the threats seriously. We were dirty kids with pocket knives and wooden sticks after all.

Sometimes we had to provoke people, to believe us, to believe that we were despite enough to stab you for a basket of biscuits or drown you for a cup of Sake. I don't remember when we became desperate enough to kill but...

"Are the demons real?"

Choji asked Iruka. Everyone stared at Iruka, being that he had been the oldest of all of us it made sense that he would be the one to know more about the world then us.

Iruka looked up and nodded.

"I've seen one, once, long ago when I toured with the military."

Ino covered her mouth in shock and looked over at me. I shook my head like a non believer and slipped down to sit on the table I had began to clear.

"Oh shit." Kiba remarked.

"Language..." Iruka chastised with a bone serious face.

Kiba lowered his head and sighed as though that look alone had been punishment enough.

"You're alive...don't the demons drain blood and kill humans."

"That's a myth!" Ino spat as though she were up to date on demon knowledge. "...this demon bullsh-...I mean this demon stuff is just the cities way of making the city cower. If there really were demons no frickin wall could keep them out of this place. The real demons are people, more distinctively the people in Konoha. I hope they all die..."

"Dramatic much.." Kiba uttered.

"Why?" Iruka asked.

Ino shrugged, her legs bobbing up antsy-like, I could tell she was back at the orphanage.

"I hate this city, the people...I hate what they did to us..I-" her voice cracked a little and her eyes became glassy but she just stared down at her feet and shrugged her shoulders.

"I wanna go home." was all she said in a resigned voice. I sighed and hopped up from the table, my chest felt tight.

"Where's home?" Iruka asked trying to look at each of our faces. He always asks us this question. We all look at one another and then Naruto stands up, wiping something from his lips with his forearm.

"Where ever its safe...c'mon guys, s'gettin late."

Everyone begins to collect themselves and head for the door after either patting Irukas shoulder or wishing him a good night. I twist around and began to rub at the tables quickly, bumping the crumbs off and onto the marble floor.

I spit quickly and rub until there's a shine to the stubborn rosewood.

"That's quite alright Sakura." Iruka halts my actions, placing a hand over mine from behind. His fingers were heavy and hot, way beyond any temperature I've ever felt. Veins crawled beneath his callous skin. This must be what it felt like, for someone to be this close. I had only known the closeness of Ino and she was softer, like me and her intentions were purely out of sisterhood. We were close like sisters.

 _What were Irukas intentions..._

His musk clouds my mossy aroma and it gets so quiet that I can hear the crickets deep in the night and my friends voices among them outside.

He places a hand on my hip and his thumb presses hard against my hip bone.

"Thanks..." he whispers in my ear and then his lips touch my cheek and and my heart hesitates to beat before going full throttle. I close my eyes, mesmerized, his lips linger and my entire body feels like it's on fire.

His breath tickles my cheek and then, he's pulling the dishcloth from my fingers and his intentions go right with him.

"Come back tonight..." was all he said.

I stood there for several seconds, my heart deafening. As much as I'd like to think that I wasn't a coward. I did not go back that night and I woke up the next morning to the sound of my entire world ending.

If I had known that, that would have been my last night seeing him, nothing would have stopped me from seeing Iruka.

But nothing had prepared me for seeing him either, if I had gone back to see him.

After all, I was just a child.


	3. Control

**A/N- Thank you for the comments and I hope you enjoy this one. Geeze it's much longer than the others. Hope you enjoy.**

* * *

 _Present day…_

Have you ever woken up from a dream that felt like death and realized you would have probably been better off staying in the dream. I don't know what I was expecting, the moment my eyes fluttered open, I think a part of me assumed that I would pick up right where I left off.

On the ground somewhere being told by the police officers that I had hit my head, they'd also caution me to be careful and in dignity I would limp back at Ino and Kiba's side no one the wiser about the punch that knocked my lights out.

I started with a groan, the skin of my cheek felt raw and tight as though someone had snatched it clean off and placed it back on. My fingers trembled to touch and then withdrew sensing that touching wouldn't offer any relief. My fingers crumble into fist and bit by bit all of my senses seem to come crashing down on me.

"I-Ino?" I utter gritting my teeth the moment I tried to stand. My knees buckled and I fell on them. There was a jingling in the distance, like chains being shaken. Plumes of dust rose up beneath me and agitated my nose. I sneeze wildly feeling my ears give off a sharp pop and I wince.

My eyes finally open and become completely aware that this wasn't the same Venue; no lines, no people, no open sky...no Ino and Kiba.

No panic, bombs or sirens.

Stark silence.

 _Am I dead?_

I'm bathing in the pale light that hung from a string overhead. A single bulb swinging slightly too high for me to reach. It's intensity should have severed my sight but instead it reminds me of the moon. My head of hair resembles a lions wild mane, bangs blinding me. I snap my neck back to peer at the light for several more seconds and then venture to look around and discover I was trapped by thin iron bars.

I was in a cage.

 _What the…actual shit.._

I frown at the prospect of being captured and on what grounds? Had the cops done this? Did they think I meant to start a brawl while in search of Naruto and Choji.

Either way I should have been allowed to explain myself.

"Hello!?" I call out sharply licking my cracked copper lips and inhaling deeply to call out once more.

"Hello! I think there's been an extreme misunderstanding!" I shout off watching flurries of ash dance around me. I swat them away irritably and try to see through the pitch darkness beyond the cages bars.

The light offered me no such luck.

The darkness stared back at me, blindingly.

I sighed.

 _Great!_

I force myself to stand with as much strength as I can muster and limp over to the bars. I grip them tight and poke my nose in between them. My hot swollen face seems to cool down against the icy iron and I bask in that feeling of relief, closing my eyes and trembling. The cold had been treating me good for once, alleviating the pulsing rawness of my face. My headache began to ebb gradually.

I almost felt normal, if I didn't think hard about the fact that I was behind bars nursing my wounds with an iron bar.

Something about this place didn't scream police headquarters or lawful to me. The atmosphere seemed dank and lifeless. It had been almost too quiet even for my liking. Stale, like it never felt the pulse of life, like, ever.

Chains rustled and a bone numbing tingle curled down my spine. I jerk myself around holding up my fist to give the impression that I knew how to use them. Instead I felt I came off like a kitten backed into a corner with nothing but claw to offer.

 _So be it!_

Flurries of ash and dust accumulated wildly and flew around but nothing else resided in the cage aside from me and…

A shiny silver chain that led to a cuff latched around my discolored ankle. Its other end extended far beyond my reach outside of the cage. I stooped down to grab the chain and calculatingly I yanked it, expecting a simple resolution of escape. Fool heartedly wishing that it would have snapped or had not been attached to anything but the moment I yanked something yanked back and I was brought forward abruptly, crashing to my knees like a tree yanked from it's roots.

"I know you're there!" I shout, outraged. "You can't hold me here, I've done nothing!"

I fold my legs in front of me and fiddle with my bonds like a menacing child.

 _Definitely not the cops, but who._

A cautious feeling pressed heavy on my chest and I tried to remember exactly what occurred before my black out. Taking a deep breath I raise my legs and bury my head into my knees with my fingernails digging into my scalp.

 _I-I was looking for Naruto and Choji….walking down the back…people….then the cops, they were yelling, about a demon…and th…._

 _Demon…_

 _H-he…_

The realization was much more terrifying then I had the face to make so I stayed tucked into myself. Digging my fingernails into my scalp.

 _Demons aren't real…just old Konoha legends. No one has ever seen one…so how could something no one has ever seen even exist since I couldn't voice my discomfort._

 _C'mon Sakura you're not dumb._

 _Whoever this was, they were masquerading as something evil. Maybe for the thrill of kidnapping kids during the worst day of humanity._

 _Anyone can be reasoned with, a few yen and an apology can fix this. Money, money was always something someone needed._

I snapped my head up and stare straight ahead, which, I was sure was a whole sea of nothingness.

"My friends are probably looking for me…" I say, sucking on my bottom lip. Although I had thought I licked off the remains of blood more seemed to take it's place.

I stare out into the darkness and focus hard to hear anything that would assure me that I wasn't alone, screaming for no reason.

"…my friends as in the Police, I'm a very important person ya know!" I lie, my heart thrashing in my chest condemning me of this lie. I would have laughed nervously had my insides not been quivering and my brain clouded with fear.

The chains shook and I looked down to see if someone had been pulling but through my own paranoia I realized it had been me triggering the noise. Trembling.

I tensed, trying to freeze my bones.

"If you p-put me back now, no one has to know….I won't mention a word of it…." I managed to bark out like someone who means it. I tried to sound snooty like Ino and condescending like Kiba. We had been friends long enough for me to borrow each of their personalities. Especially while I was trying to convince my possible murderer that I was worth sparing because I was important.

I've never felt important a day in my life so if I were incapable of pulling it off that would be why.

 _The lack of experience._

Why did I even assume someone important could get off the hook that easily anyway? Just because they were a valued member of society people would band together and bring in the Calvary and save them because they would be a pivotal point in someone's life.

I don't think I could handle that much pressure, being an important person.

Being a nobody was as easy as breathing.

You existed and nobody expected anything of you. No one placed their hopes and dreams in you because no one gave a shit. Nobodies don't need cages to be kept inside of, we lived outside of the cage and watched everyone within the cage do something we could never be capable of.

 _Matter._

Something pressed my sore ankle. The chain snapped and my cuff tugged, my ankle bone cracks and a dull pain spreads. Instinctively I reach out to clasp a bar but my fingertips are just a few feet shy and I'm dragged to the darker end of the cage. Screaming and kicking, poncho a mess. Flurries whirling overhead, the chains sounded like crystal glass and snake hisses.

I scream until I'm no longer being dragged, my ankle feels disconnected from me and as much as I try to focus all my thoughts into moving it. It never responds. As much as I'd hate to do so I scream out an anguished cry unsure of if I was upset or in pain.

 _This can't be it-this can't be-_

Fear grapples my brain and I'm unable to process the sharp pain in my ankle. All that I can think of in that moment is that I was going to die here and if not now, I would eventually.

My heart was bursting from my rib cage against the cement below. My body shook violently and hot salty tears coated my cheek. I wanted to beg for my life as meaningless as he may have felt it was but a part of me realized that it was in fact meaningless.

I had no family, no legacy, no future.

 _Who am I fighting for? Myself?_

I was doubtful.

Never knew my parents intimately though some of the people in the city always make it a habit to stop me on the street and congratulate me for looking like my mother and then scold me and assure me that she wouldn't be proud of me.

Things that I had always known but never cared to give any thought to.

I would never be my mother. She had the life that I could only dream of, she had her parents, she had food and people who adored her. She had been important. A soldier who served the country, just like Iruka.

They were similar in that aspect.

My wet cheek rests on a bed of ashes. I blink several times before the light slightly swinging above, spins.

"Is it money?" I inquire tiredly, my voice a tremor of pain and wariness. "…we have money." I say wondering if I had been loud enough for my executioner to hear. My breath feels short and I'm fighting hard to keep my tears and terror at bay.

My heartbeat is erratic and I'm trying to be the director of my sporadic emotions, I'd be no good if I lost it.

 _I've been through worse…._

"Money…generic…and mundane. I am neither of those, so I want neither."

A velvety tired voice explains rather calmly, leisurely.

I wasn't sure if I had been relieved that the voice had been human or worried that it had been. I turned over his words in my mind and rolled my eyes under their lids.

"Well, if not money, WHAT?...what's this got to do with me."

"Nothing, you were in the wrong place…at the wrong time but it's a win for me, not so much for you."

It seemed that his voice echoed in my brain several deafening times.

'Not so much for you.'

'Not so much for you.'

'Not so..'

"Can't you kidnap somebody else. I was kind of busy trying to leave a burning city…people are looking for me."

A deliciously humorless laugh echoed in my ears.

"You're a grizzly little hellion riddled with dirt and scars, whomever is looking for you, probably runs in the same pool of human waste. Spare me the lies of your worth, your dowry…your mundane existence means about as much to me as a gnat to the eye of the lord himself."

 _Ouch!_

"So let me go…it's that simple." I speak up inspite of the lump lodged in my throat. I know that his opinion of me shouldn't have mattered but I always knew I was a worthless person. Maybe hearing someone say it just made it feel more real and pathetic.

 _I'm pathetic…_

"Why on Earth would I do that?" His voice inquired irritably as though he were very close to not speaking to me altogether. "Just because you're a stain in humanity doesn't mean you have nothing, entirely to offer me." He went on to say

My chains shook a little and I could feel that he had been the manipulator behind them.

"..and I worked very hard to procure you, I don't intend to let that challenge go to waste."

 _Challenge?!_

"You kissed me…"

"It was nothing I'd ever brag about, and neither should you. I marked you…you're my property."

"PROPERTY!" I call out aghast. "Never!"

He snorted.

"Amusing how your mouth defies me but your heart lives to serve me now. You have my blood slithering in your veins and I yours."

He recited as though reading a script from a nightmare. Laying there I trembled realizing that he had bit me and what he had done after I wasn't conscious to know.

Sick. Fucking sick!

My body felt like a traitor. I hugged my shoulders and shook my head.

"Liar." I called out through my trembling lips and tight pressed teeth.

The chains jingled and foot steps padded towards me.

"Be that as it may. I shall prove to you that this is oh, so, really real. I no longer wish to waste precious time. I'm not fond of ordering you around but I shall if you insist on defying me after I graciously gave you purpose."

The cage whined out and a dark robed figure stepped inside. He wore a human face, shaped flawless with an angular nose, structured cheek bones and dark eyes with lingering flecks of silver. His raven dark hair fell over his forehead but spiked towards the back.

His eyes resembled an endless abyss.

 _The demon_

The moment he approached I found the strength to flee the gravitational pull from my gut. I crawled towards the other end of the cage determinedly.

He clapped his hands together jovially as though I were a pet scurrying away at a ball that he had tossed.

I looked over my shoulder to see him theatrically tossing back his cloak and placing both his hands into his pockets. He walked strolled towards me with his head tilted perplexedly.

"Stand up…" he said as though it were a suggestion.

I stared at him debatably and then decided that I wouldn't or perhaps I couldn't. Then my hands and feet started to gather as though someone was tugging at an invisible string attached to every limb in my body. My motions weren't fluid or thoughtless as they normally were, they hardly even seemed like my own.

Everything was jerky and detached.

I stared down at myself as though I couldn't comprehend what was happening or the fact that I knew was more appalling.

When I was standing fully erect, the cloaked young man circled me like a hawk. His fingertips tapped at his jaw and with the other he reached out to touch some part of me. I tried to yank my face away but every molecule that made me, me…worked against me.

This scared me.

I was paralyzed and mortified, tears I could see but could not feel slipped down the bridge of my nose.

"Convincing enough or do you require a show of sorts?"

"No." I began in a croak of voice. My heart heavy and burning with contempt that I could do nothing to quench.

My brain was whirling in circles to find a solution to break me free but the only constant in my mind were my friends.

 _Ino, Kiba, Choji, Naruto._

 _I hope they forget about me…I hope they're out of Konoha and on the train to a better life. They deserve that. They deserve happiness._

"Good girl.." he complimented me condescendingly.

So this is how they were, the outsiders, they viewed humanity nothing more than pieces to be used. Properties. I could see why we closed ourselves off.

This was…Impossible and yet, as I stood there, a victim of this type of power. I knew it was entirely possible, my mind just didn't want to think that…

 _This was the end._

 _This was it for me._

I didn't know his intentions but I've seen enough movies to know that if he needed to control me, it was something he didn't want to do and with all the power that demons are rumored to have.

What could I be of use for?

"Come.." he beckoned with a nudge of his head. He leaned back against the bars on the opposing side of the cage and my feet began to wobble forward.

The chains holding my legs jingled angrily and I realized that I was still attached to them and that I was running out of slack and thus not enough to make it to him.

"The chains…there isn't enou-!" I shouted out unable to stop my bodies dazed wandering.

"I know." He said with a bone-straight face. "Come…"


End file.
